Kuwait pays $2.2 billion to Dow Chemical

Kuwaits state-run chemical company will pay $2.2 billion to Dow Chemical Co., after it backed out of a planned joint plastics venture known as K-Dow.

By Alanna Byrne|May 08, 2013 at 08:00 AM

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Kuwait’s state-run chemical company will pay $2.2 billion to Dow Chemical Co., after it backed out of a planned joint plastics venture known as K-Dow.

Petrochemical Industries Co. (PIC), a unit of Kuwait Petroleum Corp., had agreed to the $17.4 billion petrochemical venture with Dow’s plastics unit, but the deal was not popular with members of the Kuwaiti parliament. The country later pulled out of the deal as the global economy stagnated in December 2008.

As the venture went south, some investors speculated that Dow would not be able to make a $15 billion purchase of chemicals maker Rohm and Haas as planned, Thomson Reuters reports. Last year, the International Chamber of Commerce’s International Court ruled that PIC had indeed violated the terms of its agreement with Dow.

“Receipt of this award enables Dow to accelerate actions that are in line with our stated priorities for uses of cash—foremost of which is paying down debt and remunerating shareholders,” Dow’s chairman and CEO, Andrew Liveris, said in a statement.

Liveris also noted that the company continues to do business in Kuwait, including four joint ventures with the country.

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